This electronic thesis or dissertation has been downloaded from Explore Bristol Research, http://research-information.bristol.ac.uk Author: Winterton, Melanie Title: Haptic Air-scapes, Materiality, and the First World War An Anthropological-Archaeological Perspective, 1914 - 2018 General rights Access to the thesis is subject to the Creative Commons Attribution - NonCommercial-No Derivatives 4.0 International Public License. A copy of this may be found at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/legalcode This license sets out your rights and the restrictions that apply to your access to the thesis so it is important you read this before proceeding. Take down policy Some pages of this thesis may have been removed for copyright restrictions prior to having it been deposited in Explore Bristol Research. However, if you have discovered material within the thesis that you consider to be unlawful e.g. breaches of copyright (either yours or that of a third party) or any other law, including but not limited to those relating to patent, trademark, confidentiality, data protection, obscenity, defamation, libel, then please contact [email protected] and include the following information in your message: •Your contact details •Bibliographic details for the item, including a URL •An outline nature of the complaint Your claim will be investigated and, where appropriate, the item in question will be removed from public view as soon as possible. HAPTIC AIR-SCAPES, MATERIALITY, AND THE FIRST WORLD WAR: AN ANTHROPOLOGICAL-ARCHAEOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE, 1914–2018 MELANIE R. WINTERTON UNIVERSITY OF BRISTOL DEPARTMENT OF ANTHROPOLOGY AND ARCHAEOLOGY A dissertation submitted to the University of Bristol in accordance with the requirements for award of the degree of PhD in the Faculty of Arts, Department of Anthropology and Archaeology May 2018 Word count: 78,185 ABSTRACT This research focuses on First World War aviators’ relationships with their aircraft from a sensorial anthropological-archaeological perspective. It offers a dimension of materiality that makes an original contribution to knowledge and complements our ideas about culture and aviation history. The diaries and memoirs of First World War aviators were ‘interrogated’ for their experiences, which were, in essence, first-person subjective phenomenological accounts. Participant observation – a sensory ethnography – was adopted by the author flying in an open- cockpit biplane. A conceptualisation of ‘haptic air-scape’ is proposed to structure aviators’ descriptions of their sensory experiences while flying open-cockpit biplanes, and to materialise their phenomenological experiences in terms of charting the beginnings of modern sensibilities in aviation. Pilots experienced new corporeal feelings, and their senses were reconfigured and culturally constructed as they learned to engage in a new way of moving in the hitherto unexplored realm of the air. The conceptualisation of haptic air-scape has many dimensions. The material world shaped aviators’ responses to the emotions of fear and anxiety they experienced on a daily basis. The thesis examines how the physical, supernatural and superstitious relationships between First World War aviators, their aircraft, and the haptic world of flying became reified in material culture. It categorises different kinds of lucky mascots carried by airmen in an attempt to focus on the nature of their attachment to objects within their conflict air world. Adding an emotional dimension to this concept, the thesis also focuses on wooden aeroplane propellers that were retrieved from crashed aeroplanes and recycled into temporary propeller grave markers. Adopting a biographical approach, the thesis identifies and analyses events in the social life of these propeller grave markers. These objects directed the behaviour of visitors to cemeteries (the bereaved, comrades, and tourists), thereby lending substance to the idea that objects make people as the living created a relationship with the deceased. The First World War, a war of matériel, caused unprecedented death and destruction, yet also initiated creativity and individuality in unexpected ways. The thesis analyses how pieces of crashed aircraft were transformed into trench art that became memory objects in key locations of post-war homes, imbued with stories and emotions, and thereby affording the objects a new significance, and providing them with a powerful presence today as commemorative legacies. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I wish to extend my gratitude to the people and institutions whose help made this research possible. First and foremost, I give my heartfelt thanks to my supervisor, Professor Nicholas Saunders, whose continuous patience, advice, support, inspiration, and enthusiasm never waned. I am also grateful to the Arts and Humanities Research Council who funded this research. I acknowledge the support received from staff at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, Imperial War Museum, RAF Museum Hendon, Shuttleworth Collection, Worcester Yeomanry Museum, the Brotherton Library at Leeds University, Cross & Cockade International, David and Kitty Freund, and Paul Cabeldu. I would also like to thank my husband, Philip, for his constant encouragement and for always being interested and enthusiastic in my work even though I was locked away in my study for long periods of time. iii DEDICATION … those who meet the members of a squadron in their hours of ease, among gramophones and pictorial works of art suggestive of luxury, forget that an actor in a tragedy, though he play his part nobly on the stage, is not commonly tragic in the green-room. If they desire intensity and gravity, let them follow the pilot out on to the aerodrome and watch his face in its hood, when the chocks are pulled away, and he opens the throttle of the engine. No Greek sculpture is finer in its rendering of life and purpose. To see him at his best they would have to accompany him, through the storm of the anti-aircraft guns, into those fields of air where every moment brings some new trial of the quickness of his brain and the steadiness of his nerve. He is now in the workshop where tradition is made, to be handed down as an heirloom to the coming generations. It will not fail to reach them. The Royal Air Force is strong in the kind of virtue that propagates itself and attains to a life beyond a life. The tradition is safe. (Sir Walter Raleigh 1922: Loc. 373–379.) iv AUTHOR’S DECLARATION: I declare that the work in this dissertation was carried out in accordance with the requirements of the University’s Regulations and Code of Practice for Research Degree Programmes and that it has not been submitted for any other academic award. Except where indicated by specific reference in the text, the work is the candidate’s own work. Work done in collaboration with, or with the assistance of, others, is indicated as such. Any views expressed in the dissertation are those of the author. SIGNED: …………………………………………… DATE: ……….…………………. v AUTHOR’S NOTE Parts of this thesis have been published in modified versions as: Winterton, M., 2012. Absent Parachute. World War I Centenary: Continuations and Beginnings, [online]. Available from: http://ww1centenary.oucs.ox.ac.uk/machineaesthetic/absent-parachute/ Winterton, M. 2012a. 18-Pounder Artillery Shells: The Great War Recycled and Re- Circulated. World War I Centenary: Continuations and Beginnings [online]. Available from: http://ww1centenary.oucs.ox.ac.uk/machineaesthetic/18-pounder-artillery-shells- the-great-war-recycled-and-re-circulated-2/ Winterton, M. 2015. ‘Woof’: Mascots and the First World War in the Air. In R. Mahoney, ed. First World War in the Air. London: Royal Air Force Museum, 106–111. vi CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES, TABLES, AND CHARTS …………………………..…………………………………..… xi ABBREVIATIONS ……………………………………………………………………………………………………… xviii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION …………………………………………………………………………………… 1 STATEMENT OF SIGNIFICANCE ………………………………………………………..……………….. 2 CONFLICT AIR-SCAPE AND HAPTICS ………………………………………………………..………… 3 The ‘nature’ of the conflict air-scape: physical realities of flying ………..…………….. 4 FEAR, ANXIETY, AND SUPERSTITION ……………………………………………………………….... 5 MATERIAL MEMORIES: SOUVENIRS AND TRENCH ART ……………..……………………… 6 IDENTIFYING THE RESEARCH TOPIC ………………………………………………………………….. 7 Aviators and aircraft: the Royal Flying Corps 1914–1918 ………………………………….. 8 SECOND OR THIRD-HAND EXPERIENCE OF VISITORS TO A MUSEUM LONG AFTER THE WAR HAS ENDED? …………………………………………………………….……………. 12 RESEARCH OBJECTIVES AND QUESTIONS …………………………………………..………..…… 14 (a) Research objectives ……………………………………………………………………………………. 14 (b) Research questions ……………………………………………………………………………………. 15 STRUCTURE OF THESIS ……………………………………………………………………………………… 15 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW, THEORETICAL APPROACHES, AND METHODOLOGIES INTRODUCTION ……………………………………………………………………………………………….. 18 LITERATURE REVIEW ……………..…………………………………………………………………..…………… 18 MODERN CONFLICT ARCHAEOLOGY: SEEING THE FIRST WORLD WAR IN A NEW PERSPECTIVE ……………………………………………………………………………………………..…….. 18 CULTURAL HISTORY ……………………………………………………………………………………….…. 22 SOCIAL HISTORY …………………………………………………………………………………….…………. 25 CONTEMPORARY WARTIME PUBLICATIONS ………………………………………..…………... 26 THE AVIATORS ………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 27 MATTERS OF AIR …………………………………………………………………………………….………… 30 THEORETICAL APPROACHES ……………………………………..…………………………………….……… 34 MATERIAL CULTURE AND MATERIALITIES …………………………………….………..………... 34 (a) Trench art …………………………………………………………………………………………….……… 38 (b)